We held the House pretty strongly, so thats good, and a reflection that candidates and ideology matter. We nominated candidates at the District level who could make the case; we didnt make the case at the national level. It also looks like we did well in state races.

Wrong lessons will be drawn from the Senate races. We nominated a moderate who lost in a Wisconsin which rejected the recall of Scott Walker. Todd Akin was not a Tea Party candidate, Sarah Steelman was and a divided field allowed a weak candidate to win the nomination. Richard Mourdocks comments, while not Akin, were damaging, but that is not why Mourdock lost; Lugar and his supporters undermined Mourdock all summer and fall before his comment, and had Republicans in Indiana been unified, Mourdock would have won. Other Senate seats were successes  Ted Cruz and Deb Fischer are good additions.

Understand that liberal candidates will be forgiven and protected by their base, as Massachusetts proves. Its always been that way, and always will be.

So what is the path now?

Stand with House members, they will need all the support they can get. Dont compromise on principles, and push the eventual legislative compromises to the right as much as possible.

If you want to make the case for a future, dont tell me its only Dunkirk! Because without frantic American efforts to rearm Britain, the Hitler Youth could have conquered her. Apart from her navy - and a decimated RAF - she was almost totally disarmed. People collected handguns to send to Britain! And because the US Army had committed to refitting the infantry with M-1 Garand rifles, it was able to surplus all the rifles it had accumulated but never sent overseas during WWI. These were exported to Britain ASAP. Not only that, but Britain was able to buy arms to be manufactured in the US - and thereby enable the US to ramp up its production in time for response to Pearl Harbor.

If the US suffers a Dunkirk, where does our temporal salvation come from?

8
posted on 11/07/2012 9:47:39 AM PST
by conservatism_IS_compassion
(The idea around which liberalism" coheres is that NOTHING actually matters except PR.)

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